Supposed to be basic, but i don't get it

From step 5  'Stappenmethode' van Wijgerden and already spending 2 evenings

In which direction does the black pawn go and who has the move?

White has the move and the black pawn goes down.

White wins by 1 Rd1+ followed by 2 Re1. White then brings the King down and arrives just in time. E.g. 1 Rd1+ Ke3 2 Re1+ Kd4 3 Kf7 e4 4 Kf6 e3 5 Kf5 Kd3 6 Kf4 e2 7 Kf3 etc.

By the way - I couldn't see it either, so I asked Stockfish. It's clever that White gains a tempo by playing Rd1+ first followed by Re1. The immediate Re1 only draws

The idea is that the black king has no shelter or if he does no way to advance the pawn.

What if black goes behind the pawn?

What about if black goes on the kingside?

Hopefully this shows you a little about rook vs pawn endgames.

1. Rd1+ Ke4 2. Re1+ Kf5 3. Kf7? would be a mistake for white: draw.

But then, black must play very carefully:

3. ... e4 4. Ke7 Kf4? 5. Kd6! and white wins.

This line is what confuses me and I doubt if I would play similar positions correctly in games.

I don't think there is another way to do this, but if anyone knows otherwise I'd be very interested.

Thanks for posting that stuff FoS.

The fact that Kf7? turns a win into a draw in your example above actually makes it even more instructive. To me, at least.

If only I had the common sense of an IM !

But I take your point

None of my analysis is wrong, I just engine checked it to be sure.

EDIT: I see it wasn't my analysis people have been referring to, never mind.

If the king strays away from the defense of the pawn you'll definitely want to cut it off with the rook before initation the king chase. That's an easy rule to always follow and why kf7 is a draw in this position:

@xman, in your first example in your first post I don't think your explanation about the king being cut off is correct. After 1 Rd1+ Ke4 2 Re1+ Kd4 3 Rd1+ ?! (the simple 3 Kf7 etc wins here by the way) Black could play 3 ... Kc4 rather than 3 ...Kc5. Then White cannot win by bringing the King down. But White still wins with 4 Re1 here - without cutting off the Black King - and then Kf7 etc

Re1+ is better than Kf7 because

"Always repeat"

- Ben Finegold

Two other positions from the same book:

Black to move draws:

White to move wins:

(Also shown from White's perspective so a1 is bottom.)

@EvertVB, did the responses to your original post help?

So you're suggesting 1 Rd1+ Ke3 2 Kf7, right? Or have I misunderstood?